Accident Probes

When the curriculum gets around to risk-management topics, one of the hazardous attitudes we learn about in ground school is invulnerability. The thing is this trait isnt necessarily about feeling as if we ourselves are bulletproof, but rather the notion that bad things happen to people other than ourselves. I have been a victim of this more than once. Dont worry-no sheet metal was bent.

Over the last couple of decades, theres been a growing realization within aviations training and safety arenas about situational awareness. The conversation generally involves ways to enhance situational awareness in the cockpit and often concentrates on technological solutions, like moving maps, or displaying real-time traffic and weather. The presumption is that greater situational awareness is better and that all of us have at least some measure of this characteristic.

As a pilot who spent the majority of his time landing on the kind of runways described by Mike Hart in his article, Off The Beaten Path, in June 2015s issue of Aviation Safety, I will testify to the fun of landing at such places. Most pilots will spend their time on surfaces free of undulations, slope and aircraft damaging debris, so it was good to be reminded of how the surface interacts with my flying.

While on the base leg for his private grass airstrip, the pilot noticed he was high, so he added flaps to increase his descent rate. On final, the airspeed was a little fast and during the landing, he flared the airplane a little high. After touchdown, the pilot applied the brakes, but the airplane did not respond, so he applied a little more brake. The airplane nosed over and came to rest inverted, sustaining substantial damage to both wings and the empennage. The pilot reported he should have performed a go-around instead of attempting to salvage the landing.

The days mission was a relatively simple out and back to a Class C airport, a couple of hours on the ground, and back to home plate. It was about 45 minutes of flying time each way. Although it was spring in Texas, the same weather would be a nice but humid peak summer day in many locations. White puffies with bases around 3500 feet msl and extending to at least 10,000 were everywhere.

I was motoring home from New Orleans a couple of months ago, sliding eastbound along the shoreline, IFR at 9000 feet. After a controller gave me a frequency change for the next controller, I switched over and listened, which I always do when coming onto a new frequency. The first transmission I heard was a pilot saying something like …and we have four hours of fuel aboard. Hmmm. In my experience, its rare for anyone to talk about their fuel availability on an ATC frequency unless theres an emergency in progress and ATC wants to know souls and endurance.

Thank you for addressing the issue of VFR flight following (Hacking VFR Flight Following, May 2017)! Your piece was good enough that I recognize I sometimes have gotten short shrift from ATC due to some communications ineptitude. An item you didnt address was the loss, and subsequent efforts to reestablish, radio contact en route. Another clarification could be wording with ground control at Class C airports to request advisories prior to departure.

Effective May 1, 2017, you may no longer need to hold an FAA third-class medical certificate to serve as pilot in command. The change results from FAA implementing a Congressional mandate enacted last year, which directed the agency to develop appropriate regulations to eliminate the third-class medical for specified flight operations. The image below, prepared by the FAA, highlights BasicMeds major provisions.

The relatively inexpensive and ubiquitous availability of in-cockpit Nexrad weather radar has helped minimize the risk of using personal airplanes compared to, say, 30 years ago. But risk and aviation seem to be a zero-sum game, since one result of this technology is that were more likely to get up close and personal with cumulus clouds in all stages of thunderstorm development than ever before. Thats not a good thing, but it is real. Along the way, most of us havent taken to heart the technologys inherent limitations for our purposes, like latency.

Aircraft had been inactive and hangared for approximately six months. While trying to troubleshoot a fuel quantity indication problem, a fuel sample revealed contamination, which was sent for analysis. While awaiting results, tanks were drained and an anti-bacterial fuel additive was added before they were refilled.